Hurricane Irma Strikes the Leeward Islands

On September 6, 2017, Hurricane Irma —an unusually powerful category 5 storm—slammed into the Leeward Islands on its way toward Puerto Rico and possibly the U.S. mainland. By definition, category 5 storms deliver maximum sustained winds of at least 157 miles (252 kilometers) per hour. When it hit the Leeward Islands, Irma’s winds surpassed 185 miles (295 kilometers) per hour—making it the strongest storm to ever hit the islands and the strongest storm ever measured for an Atlantic hurricane outside of the Gulf of Mexico or north of the Caribbean. The Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) on the Suomi NPP satellite captured this nighttime view of the storm in the early hours of September 6 as the eye was over the island of Barbuda. The image was acquired by the VIIRS “day-night band,” which detects light in a range of wavelengths from green to near-infrared and ...